Editorial: At the IRS, story of tax-and-spend

By Halifax Media

Published: Wednesday, June 26, 2013 at 03:19 PM.

Consider the General Services Administration, which was at the center of last year’s scandal over bureaucrats’ conference spending.

The GSA got in hot water after shelling out $822,000 for a regional conference in
Las Vegas
that included mind readers and a clown. That conference looks like small potatoes next to the IRS extravaganzas. Taxpayers now must wonder whether there is a culture of wasteful, abusive spending within the federal bureaucracy.

It seems likely that the IRS and the GSA aren’t the only big spenders in the
Washington
bureaucracy. In the wake of the GSA flap, the Obama administration ordered agencies to cut back on spending on conferences. But the administration and Congress might need to conduct a thorough, public review of agency budgets and administrative expenses.

At a time when projected budget deficits extend far into the future, all federal agencies should be reining in nonessential expenses. If agency leaders aren’t treating their budgets as a precious resource, President Barack Obama should promptly fire them and give assurances to the nation that he is serious about imposing fiscal discipline in
Washington
.

The Internal Revenue Service finds itself in the middle of yet another scandal, but this one might go much further than the agency that targeted conservative groups for rough treatment.

A recent report from the Treasury Department’s inspector general showed the IRS spent a whopping $50 million on conferences for employees between 2010 and 2012.

In the 2010 fiscal year, the agency spent $37.6 million on conferences with 50 or more participants. The amount spent on employee conferences declined from that mind-boggling figure to the merely outrageous total of $4.9 million in 2012.

The nation’s tax collector showed little concern for frugality while spending other people’s money. In a statement, the House Government Oversight Committee said IRS officials didn’t even bother to negotiate lower room rates — supposedly a standard practice in government — when they booked rooms for a conference in Anaheim, Calif., in 2010. The agency put on the ritz, with some attendees receiving benefits such as baseball tickets during the conference. Some attendees stayed in rooms that cost $3,500 a night.

One expense that enriched this first-rate conference experience was a $17,000 tab for a speaker who expounded on the topic of “leadership through art.” We wonder if artful leadership played any role in the targeting of tea party groups and other conservative organizations in the run-up to the 2012 election?

This extravagant agency spending provides an ironic contrast to efforts by Congress and the White House to whittle away at the $16 trillion-plus national debt. Evidently the IRS didn’t get the memos about the debt crisis and the federal sequester. The sequester is taking a toll on agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which oversees the National Weather Service; and programs that serve vulnerable people, including Meals on Wheels for homebound seniors.

Congress is tightening the nation’s belt, but the bureaucrats can’t seem to trim some rather extraordinary expenses.

Consider the General Services Administration, which was at the center of last year’s scandal over bureaucrats’ conference spending.

The GSA got in hot water after shelling out $822,000 for a regional conference in Las Vegas that included mind readers and a clown. That conference looks like small potatoes next to the IRS extravaganzas. Taxpayers now must wonder whether there is a culture of wasteful, abusive spending within the federal bureaucracy.

It seems likely that the IRS and the GSA aren’t the only big spenders in the Washington bureaucracy. In the wake of the GSA flap, the Obama administration ordered agencies to cut back on spending on conferences. But the administration and Congress might need to conduct a thorough, public review of agency budgets and administrative expenses.

At a time when projected budget deficits extend far into the future, all federal agencies should be reining in nonessential expenses. If agency leaders aren’t treating their budgets as a precious resource, President Barack Obama should promptly fire them and give assurances to the nation that he is serious about imposing fiscal discipline in Washington.